The Real Problem of the Redskins ...

[tryfuhl]

You really liked your own points in that article.

[redsk1]

DS needs to get rid of VC and model our organization after the top franchises of the last 10 years. That would be Pitts, Indi, Pats, etc. Let a FO full of top football people hire their coach and run their system.

The funny part is that w/ a great FO this organization has the assets to be a top team year in and year out.

[SouperMeister]

What scares me most as a Skins fan is that Snyder is right around my age, which means that as a fan, I may have to resign myself to rooting for a mediocre team for the rest of my life. During Gibbs 1.0, we won with dominant play on both lines of scrimmage. You can win with average QB's when the O line consistently knocks the opponent off the ball and protects the QB in the vertical passing game that requires a deeper dropback. Snyder clearly doesn't get this given the high draft choices and vast FA sums that he has poured into WRs (Rod Gardner, Laveranues Coles, Taylor Jacobs, Santana Moss, Antwaan Randle El, Brandon Lloyd, Devin Thomas, Malcolm Kelly) with little regard to building a team that dominates in the trenches.

Imagine this: what if we had done the right thing, and drafted Steve Hutchinson instead of Rod Gardner in the first round of the 2001 draft. We would have had Stephen Davis in his prime, running behind a young group led by Jon Jansen, Chris Samuels, and Hutchinson. That would have been a winning formula for years, but as usual picking a dominant G wasn't flashy enough for this FO.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by SouperMeister

What scares me most as a Skins fan is that Snyder is right around my age, which means that as a fan, I may have to resign myself to rooting for a mediocre team for the rest of my life. During Gibbs 1.0, we won with dominant play on both lines of scrimmage. You can win with average QB's when the O line consistently knocks the opponent off the ball and protects the QB in the vertical passing game that requires a deeper dropback. Snyder clearly doesn't get this given the high draft choices and vast FA sums that he has poured into WRs (Rod Gardner, Laveranues Coles, Taylor Jacobs, Santana Moss, Antwaan Randle El, Brandon Lloyd, Devin Thomas, Malcolm Kelly) with little regard to building a team that dominates in the trenches.

Imagine this: what if we had done the right thing, and drafte Steve Hutchinson instead of Rod Gardner in the first round of the 2001 draft. We would have had Stephen Davis in his prime, running behind a young group led by Jon Jansen, Chris Samuels, and Hutchinson. That would have been a winning formula for years, but as usual picking a dominant G wasn't flashy enough for this FO.

Let's disregard 2001 because that was clearly Marty's year and Cerrato wasn't even there.

But let's also not act like the Redskins are ignoring the lines either. You can make the argument that they're not effectively addressing the lines, but I think it's wrong to simply say they're ignoring them. Or to pretend that all we do is go after WRs

Dating back to 2002 we have drafted 4 WRs, 6 OL, and 4 DL.

Additionally, besides going after Moss, Patten, ARE, and Lloyd we have gone after Andre Carter, Pete Kendall, Jason Taylor, Todd Wade, Jason Fabini, Chris Wilson (plus UDFAs Alex Buzbee and Stephon Heyer)

All which leads me to two points

1. We are definitely not ignoring the trenches, we're just not addressing them correctly

2. Scott Campbell should be held largely accountable for a lot of the late round misses due to his time serving as the team's Director of College Scouting. So I'm not sure I can or should continue to defend his ascension up the Redskins food chain.

[Skinny Tee]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

Let's disregard 2001 because that was clearly Marty's year and Cerrato wasn't even there.

But let's also not act like the Redskins are ignoring the lines either. You can make the argument that they're not effectively addressing the lines, but I think it's wrong to simply say they're ignoring them. Or to pretend that all we do is go after WRs

Dating back to 2002 we have drafted 4 WRs, 6 OL, and 4 DL.

Additionally, besides going after Moss, Patten, ARE, and Lloyd we have gone after Andre Carter, Pete Kendall, Jason Taylor, Todd Wade, Jason Fabini, Chris Wilson (plus UDFAs Alex Buzbee and Stephon Heyer)

All which leads me to two points

1. We are definitely not ignoring the trenches, we're just not addressing them correctly

2. Scott Campbell should be held largely accountable for a lot of the late round misses due to his time serving as the team's Director of College Scouting. So I'm not sure I can or should continue to defend his ascension up the Redskins food chain.

Addressing your lines in the draft doesn't consist of drafting Montgomery 5th and Golston in the 6th round of the draft. I like these guys as Redskins but they aren't exactly dominators of the game. On offense drafting Heyer, or the lack thereof since he was an undrafted free agent, doesn't count either.

Addressing a position should entail making it proficiently sound enough to stand on its own. I can even think of a OL or DL, under Snyderatto, that has been selected within the first 3 rounds (save Reinhardt).

Samuels was selected at LT with a first round pick. That position has not needed to be addressed for the last 10 years. Our lines are inefficient and need to be addressed with Day One draft talent. Until then they won't be considered addressed.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by Skinny Tee

Addressing your lines in the draft doesn't consist of drafting Montgomery 5th and Golston in the 6th round of the draft. I like these guys as Redskins but they aren't exactly dominators of the game. On offense drafting Heyer, or the lack thereof since he was an undrafted free agent, doesn't count either.

Addressing a position should entail making it proficiently sound enough to stand on its own. I can even think of a OL or DL, under Snyderatto, that has been selected within the first 3 rounds (save Reinhardt).

Samuels was selected at LT with a first round pick. That position has not needed to be addressed for the last 10 years. Our lines are inefficient and need to be addressed with Day One draft talent. Until then they won't be considered addressed.

I can't tell if you actually read my post or not

[Skinny Tee]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

I can't tell if you actually read my post or not

Yeah I did, but I just don't think the signing of several half-rate FA's (save Carter) is addressing and the position proprotion draft stats you showed were bias.

Bottom line we have not focused the direction of our team to be line centric. We love the skill player and are perpetually attracted to the glitz potential a star player can bring.


I like the recent Washingotn Post article about Sherman Smith and his remarks about the Titans. Following a tempalte like that should allow us to consistently win.

[Paintrain]

Originally Posted by Skinny Tee

Addressing your lines in the draft doesn't consist of drafting Montgomery 5th and Golston in the 6th round of the draft. I like these guys as Redskins but they aren't exactly dominators of the game. On offense drafting Heyer, or the lack thereof since he was an undrafted free agent, doesn't count either.

Addressing a position should entail making it proficiently sound enough to stand on its own. I can even think of a OL or DL, under Snyderatto, that has been selected within the first 3 rounds (save Reinhardt).

Samuels was selected at LT with a first round pick. That position has not needed to be addressed for the last 10 years. Our lines are inefficient and need to be addressed with Day One draft talent. Until then they won't be considered addressed.

Dockery was a 3rd round pick. I forget if that was Marty or Spurrier though.

Either way, the whole OL argument is largely overblown. Look at the Steelers and Cards, their offensive lines were terrible this year. But, they have elite players at key positions to compensate for that. Who is the most dominant DL left in the playoffs, Hatoli Ngata? Again, overblown when you have elite players who can compensate. We lack elite players and an elite scheme.

[redsk1]

Originally Posted by Paintrain

Dockery was a 3rd round pick. I forget if that was Marty or Spurrier though.

Either way, the whole OL argument is largely overblown. Look at the Steelers and Cards, their offensive lines were terrible this year. But, they have elite players at key positions to compensate for that. Who is the most dominant DL left in the playoffs, Hatoli Ngata? Again, overblown when you have elite players who can compensate. We lack elite players and an elite scheme.

At times Pitts oline was terrible but they've come together as of late. They are run blocking well, too.

Ngata is pretty good.

[Skinny Tee]

Originally Posted by Paintrain

Dockery was a 3rd round pick. I forget if that was Marty or Spurrier though.

Either way, the whole OL argument is largely overblown. Look at the Steelers and Cards, their offensive lines were terrible this year. But, they have elite players at key positions to compensate for that. Who is the most dominant DL left in the playoffs, Hatoli Ngata? Again, overblown when you have elite players who can compensate. We lack elite players and an elite scheme.

Yeah I forgot about him but that is moot being that he left without us getting any compensation for him.


At least if our offensive line was solid we would be able to see which skill player is the liability. Making a mistake on a major skill player in the offseason is more finanicially damning than poorly drafting OL high in the draft.

[SouperMeister]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

Let's disregard 2001 because that was clearly Marty's year and Cerrato wasn't even there.

But let's also not act like the Redskins are ignoring the lines either. You can make the argument that they're not effectively addressing the lines, but I think it's wrong to simply say they're ignoring them. Or to pretend that all we do is go after WRs

Dating back to 2002 we have drafted 4 WRs, 6 OL, and 4 DL.

Additionally, besides going after Moss, Patten, ARE, and Lloyd we have gone after Andre Carter, Pete Kendall, Jason Taylor, Todd Wade, Jason Fabini, Chris Wilson (plus UDFAs Alex Buzbee and Stephon Heyer)

All which leads me to two points

1. We are definitely not ignoring the trenches, we're just not addressing them correctly

2. Scott Campbell should be held largely accountable for a lot of the late round misses due to his time serving as the team's Director of College Scouting. So I'm not sure I can or should continue to defend his ascension up the Redskins food chain.

OK, let's disregard 2001 as Marty calling the shots. Since then we have drafted only two linemen earlier than the 4th round (Dockery in 2002 and Rinehart in 2008, both 3rd rounders). During that period, we have drafted the following non-linemen in the 1st three rounds:

WR (4) - Cliff Russell, Taylor Jacobs, Devin Thomas, Malcolm Kelly
DB (4) - Rashad Bauman, Sean Taylor, Carlos Rogers, Laron Landry
TE (2) - Chris Cooley, Fred Davis
QB (2) - Patrick Ramsey, Jason Campbell
RB (1) - Ladell Betts
LB (1) - Rocky McIntosh

Fourteen perimeter/skill position players vs. just two linemen is a disproportionate use of high draft choices, and it is the biggest reason that we are mired in mediocrity. Both NY and Philly have invested high draft choices on linemen during that same period, and both have made deep runs in the playoffs. Coincidence? I think not.

[over the mountain]

i think what smootsmack is saying is that we havent ignored our O line, just havent addressed the situation properly . .

what skinnytee is saying is that by not drafting day one O line talent we have ignored the situation . .

kind of a fine line difference in definition i suppose . . i do hope we use the 13th pick on a top end talent instead of trading back and ending up with solid but not great talent. our team is full of solid but not great talent. yeah i know you can find pro-bowl players in the 2nd and 3rd rounds and no 1st rounder is guaranteed to be a pro-bowler but id take 1 top tier talent over 2 could be's at this point.

go skins!!

[RedskinsfanTilldeath]

I agree that Dan Snyder may not be the best owner. But at the same time I still like the fact that he seems to be very determined to win. Snyder may not always go the best way about trying to win but atleast he has the desire. On the flip side I'm an O's fan as well, and Pete Angelos is a stingy bum who won't spend a nickel to get the O's better, no matter how embarassing the team is. Atleast I see an eagerness in Dan Snyder to win.

[Eknox]

Hopefully he will learn that if he's not careful 0-16 could be lurking

[firstdown]

Has anyone ever thought that maybe Joe Bugel is now part of the problem. I heard him on one of the Redskins show's durn training camp that our O line was looking very strong and blowing guys off the ball. He thought that the line was going to be a strength of the Skins. Maybe he thinks that this veterain line is good and points to injuries over the past couple of years as our problem. He has been here sense 2004 and maybe he has not pushed hard enough for us to draft any O Line players and felt what we had would do. Now I do remember that Vinny wanted a lineman this year in the draft but the ones we wanted where gone by the time we had our pick. So who really knows who is at fault for not drafting any O line.